Alright, good to know! I still think that 9,000 power for Halli/Gaudi is a bit high though.

It's the same 9000 power you get for converting all the Supernals.

Honestly, when I said "virtually identical except for the health of the mobs," that's really what I meant!

Forget I said anything then, I just have to be less critical about things. I am a stick in the MUD sometimes.


I haven't really had time to check much of a difference in bashing since the mob changes. Starting to wonder if waiting to amnesty kephera was a bad idea..

It is 125 essence per sphere/fleshpot I believe

Everyone's been wrong on essence guesses so far - before under, now over. Same neighborhood, though.

I figured, still think invul periods could serve to be much higher. (with possible shield tweaks so they don't fully restore) Especially for orgs who don't have a large population to spread the burden, I didn't have much issue with it while in Celest but in Gaudiguch really I rather just log out and do other things that are actually fun.

Has anyone had luck gaining amnesty from Maeve yet? I tried a second round, no go. The hits start coming for 2000 and outdo my curing.

We both used kirigamis.

And with my beast I went faster than I did without, so piffle at that!

Are the planes harder to navigate when you're raiding, or is that more about places for defenders to attack?

I saw a fleshpot go down in 46s from the first blow with no deaths apart from me three times, and the group wasn't even perfectly coordinated. Are spheres similar? Hopefully the update has increased those a bit.

I'll try and work out how to post the log too.

You have to move a group of 20-ish people through ripple/distort (the former causing 2s of stun to random members of your group every second, the latter preventing teleportation) and possibly shrine gravity (which just makes the thing damn near impossible). You basically have to split your group up to move in a reasonable period of time, which yes, gives the defenders a greater opportunity to pick people off. It also allows the defenders to pick and camp a room that you need to pass through.

I will outline my main issue with mob updates:

mob buffs = mages =! hunt astral. Where before, fully buffed, I was able to tank 2 astral mobs (depending) solo, now 1 almost kills me, at demigod. I don't like this. At all. It means I pretty much can't hunt astral. Can we fix this, please? (And no, don't tell me to go warrior. Hunting should be viable for all classes, not just monks and warriors.)

Influencing is a nice change. So are all the gold drops, and karma. I love all of these so much that I've bashed more on prime in the past weekend than I have in three or four weeks. I don't notice much difference in mob strength aside from astral and manifestations, though I haven't gone to Muud yet.

Influencing, though. My level 50ish Faeling warrior with beauty/populus/fortuna takes 19 hits to do a guard with only two influence skills. Even more with the updates.

Whoops.

It's pretty hard to get an exact count as you go. Is there some specific reason why we aren't being told?

Also, @Aeral, that's the first time I've heard anyone say guards are harder now. Maybe it's a cha-aura issue?

I didn't find guards harder, exactly, but they do take more to influence (in my case, 5-6 to 7). Then again, I've got all three empowerings; if you've only got two, you do lose influence-power faster, and with the extra ego, it could take a lot longer.

Don't forget those insanely strong plane mobs giving blackout and other afflictions.



I've actually found guards easier, insofar that they're taking less ego, never noticed how many hits it usually took for me. Only have 15-16 cha at a time, and only the first two empowering attacks.

@Vey
I only bash/influence because people bully me into it. I'd rather just code or something. I'm a pushover.
And for experience and esteem/gold when I'm bored.

@Tetra- We'll have to see if the mob changes have done anything, but I've figured out that there is no possible way to convince Eventru that Spheres are (or were) mechanically easier to raid and kill nor is there any way to make him see how frustrating it is to have the axis of conflict be centered around Gaudiguch/Hallifax because people have experienced it being easier than raiding Supernals/DLs/Avatars and not being able to even keep your shield at full because no one smob raids anywhere else anymore. That could be partially perception bias, but other people have recognized the same thing as well and Eventru doesn't believe it.



Only on Vortex. Continuum is set up so that you can take a different route (even more routes open up if you have already taken out a sphere or two and can cut across levels through the sphere room).

To me, it seems the Continuum should, in theory, be very easy to raid once a sphere or two is down, based solely on geography. That's not taking into account nexus/shrine powers, but those aren't Hallifax-specific.

Well, there have been 3 DL raids, two of which I've been part of, I think 2 Sphere raids, and 1 Avatar raid. Counts for the last two I'm not fully sure about, but I do know there have been 3 DL raids.

You're right, ripple and distort do make it a lot harder(think I may have been there for that one). The only problem is discretionary powers can be expensive for fledgling orgs to upkeep. An hour is a long time - I can't say that raid would last even a fraction of that time in the case of Continuum.

If you know how things work, you can get to each sphere in 2 steps, maybe 4.

Now now, don't put words into my mouth.

I understand (and acknowledge) that conflict is centred around Hallifax and Gaudiguch currently. I don't doubt that people think they're easier to raid - I think a big part of that is that Gaudiguch and Hallifax are small, playerbase-wise. I don't believe the spheres are unbalanced or markedly weaker (damage-wise, their output is just a little under Baalphegar, who isn't far under the rest of the half-formed excepting big ones - and you fight three at once!), I believe the geography of the planes make it far more difficult to kill them all before defenders arrive, and overall the process far more time consuming.

I think people are blowing things out of proportion - time and time again we've seen people cry that this skillset is underpowered or no one uses it so it must be bad, then we see a skilled combatant come along, use it properly, and suddenly it's overpowered nerf (Tracking is a fine example of this - I remember early on it was regarded as 'useless,' then people started to really figure out how to use the hell out of their skills!). I think time will bear out and show they're solidly on par with everything else.

(To Tetra)

And discretionary power costs is a poor argument from Hallifax - they've said time and again the only construct they consider 'worthwhile' is the one that provides free discretionary powers on Cosmic, which they maintain on their nexus world. So while the argument itself might be fair at its base, it doesn't apply to the situation at hand.

There have been three raids on the Spheres. Two took them all down. In the most recent, the defense managed to fight them off.